Employment in healthcare continued to trend upward in May, with 62,000 jobs added during the month, according to the Employment Situation summary published Friday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

That’s higher than the average monthly gain of 44,000 over the prior 12 months, according to BLS. In April, the healthcare sector added 51,000 jobs.

Overall, the economy added 139,000 jobs in May.

Among the healthcare segments, hospitals and ambulatory healthcare services gained the most jobs last month, at 30,000 and 28,000 jobs added, respectively. Nursing and residential care facilities, including assisted living and continuing care retirement communities, saw an increase of 6,000 jobs.

The nation’s unemployment rate remained steady, at 4.2%, month over month. That’s approximately 7.2 million unemployed Americans. According to the BLS, the unemployment rate has hovered between 4% and 4.2% since May 2024.

The number of people who have been jobless for less than five weeks increased by 264,000 to 2.5 million in May. The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more) decreased over the month by 218,000, to 1.5 million.

“Both measures were little changed over the year. The long-term unemployed accounted for 20.4% of all unemployed people in May,” according to the BLS.

Average hourly wages in the private sector increased by $0.15, or 0.4%, to $36.24 from April to May. In the public sector, hourly wages increased by $0.12, or 0.4%, to $31.18.

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